A question for people who have stopped drinking diet drinks

Weight loss is calories in vs calories out. Som drinking Diet sodas doesn't affect it.

Aside from not feeling so bloathed all the time I don't think there was any other effects for me.
Mind you I am sure they aren't too good for you. If I am to drink a soda I don't drink the diet kind anymore, I'll drink a regular one and fit it in my calories

booze is way better then those diet drinks.

An interesting little thing I found online:

http://caloriecount.about.com/forums/motivation/water-vs-coke-off

I try to tell myself not to drink the "poison" lol

I've had about 2 glasses of coke since the start of the summer, so I've pretty much cut out all fizzy drinks. I haven't touched them since I saw what the acid in them does to your teeth!

As for differences, I've noticed my sugar-only cravings have pretty much gone. I used to get hit by non-stop sweet cravings at 8pm, but now it's just, "I feel like eating something" and a cup of tea (no sugar! :P) will do the trick. I used to have chocolate bars and a PINT of coke. Big difference if you ask me!

I'm reposting this from another thread on diet soda.

I had SERIOUS diet coke habit. When I decided it was time to start taking better care of myself (including losing weight), I knew I had to cut out the diet coke. I should mention that my office keeps a fridge full of soda that we can drink for free so it was easy to drink 2-3 a day.

Anyway, I started limiting myself to one a day for a few weeks. I started drinking a lot of Topo Chico mineral water because I loved the fizzy. After about a week I started noticing that I wasn't even finishing the one can a day so I stopped. As of today it's been two weeks since I've drank any diet coke. (it's been almost three now)

I have made a lot of changes to my diet in the last month but that was one of the hardest ones for me. I buy mineral water and lemon la croix and keep it at home and at work so when I feel the need for something fizzy. It was a hard habit to break but I'm so glad I did it!

I haven't really seen any actual health benefit yet but I'm definitely drinking way more water so that's a good thing.

I cut mine down significantly, and started drinking water with crystal light packets, and I have noticed a huge difference in not only weight loss and my budget but how I feel. I just feel better. I am down to one can per day (I drank way more than 3-4 cans), if desired (I had no headaches reducing to one per day) and I will eventually - when I am ready - to cut altogether. I definitely recommend at least cutting down and replacing with water. Or rotate every other pop, water, pop, water, etc... Anyway, that is my take on it. Good luck!

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I was way over your intake--typically about 8 cherry diet pepsi or cherry zero a day. I decreased slowly and substituted with the flavored waters (yes, the diet kind) or perrier or san pellingrino -- usually the fizzy waters with lime.

Health wise, I haven't noticed anything besides no more caffeine withdrawal headaches.

If I stick to the flavored waters, my wallet feels better!

I had headaches really bad while I drank diet coke daily....and migraines. I've always drank plenty of water. But, when I stopped drinking diet cokes daily (I still do on occasion), the headaches pretty much stopped, I drank even more water which has helped my skin. I also don't feel as dehydrated of course.

Other things are though I still crave sweets, I don't crave them as much, or it's easier to fight the craving. I am a believer that artificial sweeteners are horrible for you. And though you may not see or feel the affects of stopping usage of them immediately, I do personally believe that you will prevent negative issues in the future.

The biggest problem with diet soda for me is the immoderate way I consume it. They're so low in sodium these days that that's not even really a problem, no calories, so hey, might as well have a whole 2-liter bottle in a day, what's the harm?

The harm, my dentist tells me, is several thousand dollars in dental bills caused by crazy acid erosion of my enamel, right in the perfect pattern on my teeth that he could tell I usually drank from a bottle and not a can, even. Pro-tip: use a straw.

Unfortunately, I don't notice any quick changes (or even slow changes) in my teeth or elsewhere in my body when I switch to carrying around a 2-L bottle of water instead. The one benefit of switching is that I sleep a lot more soundly, without the caffeine. I use the SleepBot app on my phone, which will graph how much you move around at night. Even if I stopped drinking soda late afternoon/early evening, I can still see the effects of that day's caffeine on my sleep.

Caffeine withdrawal headaches are a bear, but in my experience, they respond really well to Tylenol (when for most other headaches of mine it doesn't do a thing).

I stopped drinking diet drinks, diet gum, diet everything basically and what I noticed is that the bloated, stiff feeling of water retention was dramatically reduced. I stopped all that about 10 years ago now and I wouldn't go back for anything. I don't know if it's relevant but I am 61 years old and on no medications whatsoever. I try to eat as real as I can but know I still eat processed foods in some form or another. I just draw the line at artificial sweeteners. I'm sure that the less chemicals we put into our bodies the better, but that's only my opinion.

It saves me lots of money.